Author: Sjoerd van der Helm

In a step toward more effective and inclusive water solutions worldwide, leadership of the Dutch Water Authorities (Unie van Waterschappen), IHE Delft Institute for Water Education, and Rotary Netherlands gathered at the annual Rotary Water Congress on Saturday 10 May 2025 to sign a Letter of Intent (LoI) to strengthen their strategic collaboration for the next four years.

With this signing, the three organisations build on earlier informal collaborations within the Dutch Water Authorities’ international Blue Deal programme. The Letter of Intent marks a shared commitment to combine their complementary knowledge, networks, capacities and expertise to increase their joint impact in the fields of water safety, water availability, water quality, and good water governance. 

Collaboration

This enhanced collaboration reflects a shared ambition: to strengthen the global response to growing water-related challenges, especially in light of climate change. Key areas of collaboration include: 

• Exchanging information on current and upcoming projects, including training and education opportunities 

• Exploring collaborations within the Blue Deal partner, IHE Delft and Rotary networks  

• Investigating co-funding opportunities for specific water-related projects 

The Letter of Intent was signed on behalf of the three organisations by Luzette Kroon (Dutch Water Authorities), Prof. Dr. Eddy Moors (IHE Delft Institute for Water Education), and Jan de Mooij (Rotary Netherlands). 

“By joining forces, we can scale up meaningful water solutions – empowering communities, reinforcing good governance, and ensuring that more people around the world gain access to clean and safe water”, Luzette Kroon said about the collaboration. 

(pictured: Signing of the Letter of Intent) 

About the Partners 

The Dutch Water Authorities (Unie van Waterschappen) represent the 21 regional water authorities in the Netherlands. These public organisations have centuries of expertise in managing water systems, flood protection, and water quality – experience they actively share internationally. This is largely done through the Blue Deal programme. This is a joint programme of the Dutch Water Authorities and the Ministries of Foreign Affairs and of Infrastructure and Water Management. It’s goal is to exchange knowledge with 17 international partner water authorities in 15 countries worldwide.  

IHE Delft Institute for Water Education is the world’s largest international graduate water education facility. Based in Delft, the Netherlands, it empowers professionals from around the globe through education, research, and capacity development in water management. 

Rotary Netherlands, part of the global Rotary network, brings together a diverse community of professionals and volunteers committed to humanitarian service. Through its local clubs and international reach, Rotary plays a catalytic role in driving community-led development, including clean water and sanitation projects. 

From 8 to 11 July, a Regional Meeting took place in Mombasa, Kenya, gathering Blue Deal partnerships from 7 African countries. They discussed and developed their knowledge on sustainable financing of Integrated Water Resources Management.

The 4-days programme covered topics on Integral Water Resources Management (IWRM): water pricing, finances, and nature-based solutions, which were discussed during workshops, interactive sessions, plenary discussions, break-out groups and a field visit. Furthermore, the cooperation focused on bringing in external funding for water management.

Why an African Regional Meeting?

The African Regional Meeting was organised to further exchange knowledge after a few African Blue Deal partners discovered their mutual challenges in sustainable financing at the first Blue Deal Congress in June 2023 in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. The seeds were planted for the idea to further explore possibilities to share knowledge to improve their current strategies on sustainable financing of IWRM. As a result, the African Blue Deal Regional Meeting was drawn up. 

7 countries

Blue Deal partnerships from 7 countries all over Africa joined the meeting: Burkina Faso, Eswatini, Ethiopia Abbay and Ethiopia Awash, Ghana, Kenya, Mozambique and South Africa. Representatives of Nature for Water, the Global Water Partnership, and the international Association of Netherlands Municipalities (VNGi) were present as partners during the event and shared their expertise.

Results

During the week, the 40 participants shared their best practices, creative ideas, common challenges and important lessons that they learned in establishing their own route towards sustainable financing. Some general conclusions and valuable insights are drawn up from the African Regional Meeting in Kenya, Mombasa, that covered the discussions on sustainable financing of IWRM. These are, among others:

• Insight in and knowledge of water users, regulations, licensing and enforcement are essential to achieve sustainable financing of catchment management.
• In-country funding and fundraising experts and expertise are needed in the Blue Deal partnerships to attain external funding.
• We cannot realise water management on our own: we need the community, the partnerships and other institutions outside of the water sector to join forces.
• The employees of the Dutch water authorities who attended gained knowledge about community-based working, involving the public in decision-making processes and they gained insights in working methods around water pricing.

Plans for improvements

The partnerships that were present are committed to improve their actions when it comes to:

• stakeholder engagement (water users) in the pricing concept;
• the exchange of data collection and working methods between countries, as it is essential to set tariffs and fees;
• awareness creation and communication in a social inclusive way, around the advantages and the value of water;
• lobbying within the countries: to become more visible at national and local government level to advocate for water within overlapping sectors/policies.

On March 22 it is World Water Day. This is always an extra special day for the Blue Deal. Today, we celebrate our anniversary! Because it all began on March 22, 2018.

And how far we have come, and at the same time: how much more we aim for! In our Phase 1 Report, we have summarised what we have achieved, what didn’t go so well, and where we can achieve even more success.

What was Phase 1?

In 2018 the official documents for the Blue Deal were signed and we started working on forming the partnerships. In 2019, the partnerships really started their work. Phase 1 is the period of 2019-2022.

What can we conclude from Phase 1?

• The first success was evident from the size of our programme. We were supposed to start with 6 partnerships. Now we have 17!
• The pandemic led to setbacks and delays. But it also brought some benefits. We became better at hybrid working, and the focus shifted away from mainly work visits. We also realised the importance of individuals being ‘on the ground’. Therefore, we have further invested in local capacity.
• Our learning programme has been professionalised with, among other things, 6 Communities of Practice and regional meetings between partner countries. And, a Blue Deal YEP batch started in 2022, which allowed our partnerships to both accelerate their work as well as accelerate learning from each other.

Progress

Overall, we conclude that we have made significant progress, particularly in the area of knowledge exchange on specific water topics. Examples include trainings on wastewater treatment, working together on Water Allocation Plans, and setting up participative monitoring of water quality.

We have also worked on strengthening water institutions, for example in the area of water pricing, or in specifying roles and responsibilities within water authorities. In this area, we see progress, but naturally, these are slow processes. This is why it is so important that the Blue Deal is there for the long run. In terms of relational management, such as actively involving stakeholders, this is something that happens more and more in the areas where the Blue Deal works.

Onwards to clean, safe, and sufficient water for 20 million people around the world by 2030!